Chapter 12

THEO MCLEAN AND ANNABELLA Lu were on their own.

Their task was to prevent the Halloween dance from happening.

When the school day ended, the children all headed for their homes, emptying the building and leaving Lu and Theo alone.

“Let’s go see where the dance is going to be held,” Theo said. “It might give us an idea of how to stop it.”

The two ran straight for the gym, where they found a group of kids in the process of transforming the space into a Halloween extravaganza. Massive black-and-orange crepe paper spiderwebs hung from the rafters; dozens of plastic jack-o’-lanterns dangled from invisible wires, their leering faces appearing to float overhead; strings of orange twinkle lights were spread near the ceiling to give the illusion of orange stars in a night sky; and tangled white cobwebs adorned the basketball hoops and the scoreboard and most everywhere else the kids could think of. The decorations all played into the fun side of Halloween.

None had anything to do with the actual terror that awaited.

“This’ll be easy,” Lu said. “When the dance starts, I’ll pull the fire alarm. The fire trucks will come and evacuate the place.”

“What good will that do?” Theo said. “They’ll figure out it’s a false alarm and let everybody back in. And what if the witches do their dirty work with everybody outside? No, we have to stop the dance from happening.”

“You kids here to help?” a friendly voice called to them.

The popular social studies teacher, Mr. Martin, approached them. He was struggling to hold on to a dozen of the plastic jack-o’-lantern decorations.

“The more the merrier,” he added.

“Uh, no,” Lu said, her brain racing. “We came to say maybe the dance should be postponed.”

“Why?” Martin asked with a frown of curiosity.

Lu had no answer. She shot a desperate look to Theo, hoping he could pick up the pieces.

Theo nearly jumped with surprise. He wasn’t expecting to have to come up with something on the spot.

“Uh, yeah,” he said, tugging on his ear. “The weather’s supposed to be bad tonight. Lots of rain and lightning, real doomsday kind of stuff. It would be safer to have the dance tomorrow.”

He looked to Lu for backup.

Lu scowled at him. She wasn’t impressed.

Martin chuckled. “I wouldn’t worry about that. Everybody will be safe and dry inside. Come on, give me a hand.”

He turned to head back toward the stage.

“What about the bomb threat?” Lu blurted out.

Martin stopped as if he had hit an invisible wall. The jovial smile dropped from his face.

“What bomb threat?” he asked with true concern.

“You didn’t know?” Lu said, then looked to Theo. “Tell him.”

Theo nearly jumped again. He gave Lu a dirty look and tugged harder on his ear.

“Yeah, we thought everybody knew,” he said. “There was a post. On Instagram. Somebody wrote the dance was going to be a dangerous place and if people were smart they’d stay away or risk being in the middle of an explosion.”

“Somebody wrote that on Instagram?” Martin asked, incredulous.

“Yeah,” Lu said. “They probably deleted it by now, but still, that’s pretty scary. You gotta call off the dance until the police can figure out if it was real or some dumb hoax.”

“You saw the post?” Martin asked.

“Yeah,” Lu said.

“No,” Theo said simultaneously.

Martin put the jack-o’-lanterns down on the gym floor.

“If it was on Instagram, what was the picture of?” Martin asked, staring right at Lu.

Theo gave Lu a smug smile. It was her turn to scramble.

“It was a…a…skull! Yeah. A real creepy, evil smiley thing. Very scary. Ominous, you might say.”

“Show me,” Martin said, his concern growing by the second.

Lu took out her phone and scrolled through her Instagram pictures.

“I told you, it’s gone,” she said. “It may just be a dumb prank, but can we take that chance?”

Martin held out his hand and Lu gave him her phone. He scrolled quickly through her Instagram pictures but found nothing.

“You’re right, we can’t risk it,” Martin finally said, still holding Lu’s phone.

“Really?” Lu said with surprise.

Martin turned to the kids in the gym and called out, “Keep working, everybody. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

He looked to Theo and Lu and quietly added, “Don’t want to cause a panic. Let’s go.”

He blew right by the two, headed for the exit.

Theo and Lu gave each other surprised looks as if they couldn’t believe how well their impromptu plan was working, and followed obediently.

“Where are we going?” Lu asked.

“We’ve got to take this to Mr. Jackson, the principal,” Martin replied. “Only he can make the final decision, but I’m going to recommend that he cancel the dance and call the police to start an investigation.” He glanced to Theo and said, “Can I see your cell phone? Maybe the post is cached there.”

“I don’t have one,” Theo replied.

“Doesn’t matter,” Martin said, all business. “Even if the post is gone, I think Mr. Jackson has to call the dance off.”

Theo and Lu exchanged excited looks. Theo held up one hand for a high five, but Lu left him hanging.

“Uh, do we really have to go with you to the principal?” Lu asked. “I mean, all he has to do is hear it from you.”

“Oh no,” Martin replied. “You guys saw it, so you have to report it. Let’s hope this is all a prank, but if not, you could be heroes.”

“We don’t want to be heroes,” Theo said. “We just don’t want anybody to get hurt.”

“Then we’re all on the same page. This way.”

Martin led Theo and Lu up a flight of stairs and down another corridor of the empty classrooms.

“Do you really think the principal will call off the dance?” Lu asked.

“I don’t see how he can’t,” Martin replied. “He’ll have to send out a mass email to all the parents. It’ll be a mess, but better safe than sorry.”

They reached a door at the end of the corridor. Martin held it open and gestured for Theo and Lu to step inside. They walked past him and into the room to discover…

…it wasn’t the principal’s office. Or anybody’s office. It was an empty classroom being used for storage. There were a bunch of old desks stacked against the walls, and boxes of used books and several old-fashioned blackboards leaning against a wall.

Lu and Theo stood, staring with confusion.

“This is the principal’s office?” Lu asked as they both turned back to Martin, who stood in the doorway.

“Don’t bother screaming for help,” Martin said with a smile. “There won’t be anybody close enough to hear you until Monday morning. Come to think of it, after tonight nobody may come back here ever again.”

“But…what?” Lu asked, totally baffled.

“You were right about the dance tonight,” Martin said. “A bomb is going to go off. Just not the kind you made up.”

The truth hit them like a cold, sharp gust of wind.

“You’re a witch,” Theo said with a gasp. “But you’re a teacher. Kids like you.”

“Crazy, right?” Martin scoffed. “I’m so incredibly sick of pretending to care about you brats. Tonight it ends. Or begins, depending on how you look at it.”

As he turned to leave, he held up Lu’s cell phone and said, “I’ll hold on to this.”

“You’re all just evil!” Lu yelled at the witch.

“Not really,” Martin said as he backed out of the door. “You should thank me for locking you up here. It’ll be the safest place in the whole school. Happy Halloween.”

“No!” Lu yelled, and ran for the door as Martin slammed it shut.

She tried to open the door, but it was locked.

“How is this possible?” she screamed with frustration. “You can’t lock somebody into a classroom! It doesn’t work that way!”

Theo tried the door as well. He put his shoulder against it and pushed, but the door wouldn’t budge.

“I guess maybe it does,” he said, defeated. “We’re stuck.”

Lu glanced out the window to see the black moon near the top of the trees. A razor-thin silver crescent appeared at its edge, like a taunting smile. The moon would soon dip out of sight, along with the sun, on the opposite horizon, turning the world over to the dark night of Samhain.

“It’s getting late,” Lu said. “I sure hope Marcus got to Ainsley.”